Equipment & Material
2000’s
In line with intention in order to make manufacturing equipment the platform for the semiconductor industry, development of manufacturing equipment and materials for VLSIs, which were progressing according to the CMOS scaling, was promoted based on the ITRS (International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors) issued every odd-numbered year since 1998.
2001: 300mm wafer process start
ULSI production using 300 mm wafers started in 2001. Since then, the 300 mm wafer became mainstream of 90nm and following technology node ULSIs. In this case, the aspect was different from past wafer diameter transitions. Power semiconductors, MEMS, sensors and 110nm node or longer VLSIs were fabricated using 8-inch (200mm) wafers. Both 300 mm and 8-inch wafer process technologies had grown in parallel.
First half of the 2000s: Rapid heating/cooling vertical furnace
In 2001, Tokyo Electron announced a faster heating and cooling vertical furnace that was able to shorten the TAT (Turn Around Time) for small-volume, wide-variety SoC production and reduce the thermal budget required for CMOS device miniaturization.
2000s: ArF immersion scanner
In 2003, ASML announced the immersion exposure system, and this system became the mainstream in photolithography for fine pattern wafer processing.
2000s: Compliance with the RoHS Directive
In 2006, the RoHS Directive regulating the use of certain hazardous substances came into effect. Semiconductor-related companies took proactive measures to comply with this directive.
